“You may write me down in history with your bitter, twisted lies, you may trod me in the very dirt, but still, like dust, I'll rise.”
Maya Angelou · "Still I Rise," And Still I Rise, 1978
quolira
quolira.com
One day our descendants will think it incredible that we paid so much attention to things like the amount of melanin in our skin or the shape of our eyes or our gender instead of the unique identities of each of us as complex human beings.
739 / 1172
About this quote
Meaning
This reflection asks us to imagine a future generation looking back at our era with disbelief, wondering why people organized so much of their social and political life around surface characteristics that say very little about who a person actually is. The quote pushes toward a vision of human identity grounded in depth and individuality rather than in categories that are, in a meaningful sense, accidents of birth. It is both a critique of the present and a quiet expression of hope.
Context
The sentiment fits naturally into late twentieth century conversations about civil rights, racial justice, and gender equality. Franklin A. Thomas spent many years leading the Ford Foundation, one of the largest philanthropic organizations in the world, and his work consistently focused on social equity and human development. Quotes attributed to public figures in that space often circulate widely and sometimes shift slightly in wording over time, so the exact original source of this particular phrasing is difficult to pin down with certainty.
About the author
Franklin A. Thomas served as president of the Ford Foundation from 1979 to 1996, making him the first Black leader of that institution. Before that role he had a distinguished career in law and community development. His tenure at the Foundation was marked by a strong commitment to addressing inequality across race, gender, and geography. He has been recognized as a significant figure in American philanthropy and civic life.
Up next
“Hold fast to dreams, for if dreams die, life is a broken-winged bird that cannot fly.”
Langston Hughes · "Dreams," 1922
“I am not tragically colored. There is no great sorrow dammed up in my soul, nor lurking behind my eyes. I do not mind at all.”
Zora Neale Hurston · "How It Feels to Be Colored Me," World Tomorrow, 1928
“Life's most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?”
Martin Luther King Jr. · "A Question of Life or Death," speech, Louisville, Kentucky, March 1956
“We know what we are, but know not what we may be.”
William Shakespeare · Hamlet, Act 4, Scene 5
“There is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives.”
Audre Lorde · "Learning from the 60s," speech at Harvard, February 1982
“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.'”
Martin Luther King Jr. · "I Have a Dream" speech, Lincoln Memorial, August 28, 1963
“The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression.”
W.E.B. Du Bois · "John Brown," 1909
“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”
James Baldwin · "As Much Truth As One Can Bear," The New York Times Book Review, 1962
“I freed a thousand slaves. I could have freed a thousand more if only they knew they were slaves.”
Harriet Tubman · widely attributed, circa 1896
“Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”
Frederick Douglass · "If There Is No Struggle, There Is No Progress," speech, 1857
“Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.”
Charles R. Swindoll · Strengthening Your Grip, 1982
